The Salih Tatlıcı Foundation has donated to the Search and Rescue Association (AKUT), which aims to minimize the loss of life in such events by carrying out correct search and rescue work with an amateur and professional approach, completely voluntarily, as always in the great earthquake disaster that our country has experienced.
Our hope continues for those waiting to be rescued under the rubble.
Uğur Tatlıcı, Executive Board Member of our foundation, said: “Although more than a week has passed, all the relevant organizations continue to carry out their duties with great sacrifice, risking their lives to rescue living beings from the rubble of the buildings destroyed by the earthquake. Since the day of the disaster, we have continued to support AFAD, the most competent institution in our country in this field. This time our Foundation donated to “AKUT”, the first voluntary search and rescue association of our country, which has won the affection and trust of the whole world, especially the Turkish people, with its national and international search and rescue activities. We sincerely wish that our citizens and all living creatures waiting to be rescued under the rubble will be reunited with their loved ones as soon as possible”.
Search and Rescue Association (AKUT)
In 1994, after an unsuccessful 14-day search for 2 university students who had gone missing in the Bolkar mountains, a group of mountaineers who knew the mountains well, but had little knowledge of search and rescue, came together and founded AKUT in 1995. In the same year, this group carried out the first rescue operation in Uludağ under the name of AKUT. The association was officially established on 14 March 1996 under the name “AKUT Search and Rescue Association”. AKUT, the first Search and Rescue Association of Turkey, was founded to carry out accurate and effective search and rescue activities in mountainous and other difficult natural conditions. On 19 January 1999, AKUT was granted the status of “Public Benefit Association” by a decision of the Council of Ministers due to its usefulness in the 1998 Adana-Ceyhan earthquake. During the Marmara earthquake of 1999, AKUT, with the help of 150 volunteers, saved the lives of more than 200 people and won the affection and trust of the Turkish people.
Since 1999, AKUT has been a member of INSARAG, the Search and Rescue Advisory Board under the umbrella of the United Nations, and has become one of the most experienced and knowledgeable earthquake search and rescue teams in the world according to international standards. In 2018, AKUT completed the EU ModEX exercise, which took place at the same time as the “INSARAG” reassessment test in Montana, Bulgaria. As a result, it became the first urban search and rescue team from Turkey to join the European Civil Protection Mechanism (EUCPM). In 2020, it achieved another global success as the first search and rescue team from Turkey to join the European Civil Protection Pool (ECPP) within the European Civil Protection Mechanism under the European Commission.
AKUT, one of the most trusted organizations in Turkey, continues its awareness-raising activities in line with its social responsibility approach. In this context, seminar units provide “Basic Disaster Awareness” and “Earthquake Awareness” seminars, reaching 100,000 people with an average of 2,000 sessions per year.
